Memo to Religious People: Many Atheists Don't Want to Hear That Their Loved Ones "Are in Heaven" -- New Group for Non-Believers Helps Atheists GrieveIn a society that reflexively copes with death by using religion, grieving atheists are turning to each other.

How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

A new online faith-free grief support group, Grief Beyond Belief, is grappling with that very question. And the launch of the group, along with its rapid growth, presents another compelling question: Why do so many atheists need and want a separate godless subculture... for grief support, or anything else?

Grief Beyond Belief was launched by Rebecca Hensler after the death of her 3-month-old son. Shortly after Jude's death, she discovered Compassionate Friends, an online network of parents grieving the deaths of their children. But even though Compassionate Friends is not a religious organization, she says, "I often felt alienated by assurances from other members that my son was in heaven or by offers to pray for me, comforts that were kindly meant but that I do not believe and cannot accept."

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:Memo to Religious People: Many Atheists Don't Want to Hear That Their Loved Ones "Are in Heaven" -- New Group for Non-Believers Helps Atheists GrieveIn a society that reflexively copes with death by using religion, grieving atheists are turning to each other.

How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

A new online faith-free grief support group, Grief Beyond Belief, is grappling with that very question. And the launch of the group, along with its rapid growth, presents another compelling question: Why do so many atheists need and want a separate godless subculture... for grief support, or anything else?

Grief Beyond Belief was launched by Rebecca Hensler after the death of her 3-month-old son. Shortly after Jude's death, she discovered Compassionate Friends, an online network of parents grieving the deaths of their children. But even though Compassionate Friends is not a religious organization, she says, "I often felt alienated by assurances from other members that my son was in heaven or by offers to pray for me, comforts that were kindly meant but that I do not believe and cannot accept."

So those who come to religion sections on web sites don"t want to here about anti-religion rhetoric, I mean that is the reason for posting on a religious section, to talk about one"s beliefs, and the beliefs of others correct? Would the same apply to those who post here that have no religious beliefs?

Besides, it's unrealistic to have expectations of those who don't know you, or really care about you. That would be delusional, it doesn"t matter what the organization calls itself. The world isn't going to nor is it required to conform to one's needs because one needs it, or wants it.

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:Memo to Religious People: Many Atheists Don't Want to Hear That Their Loved Ones "Are in Heaven" -- New Group for Non-Believers Helps Atheists GrieveIn a society that reflexively copes with death by using religion, grieving atheists are turning to each other.

How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

A new online faith-free grief support group, Grief Beyond Belief, is grappling with that very question. And the launch of the group, along with its rapid growth, presents another compelling question: Why do so many atheists need and want a separate godless subculture... for grief support, or anything else?

Grief Beyond Belief was launched by Rebecca Hensler after the death of her 3-month-old son. Shortly after Jude's death, she discovered Compassionate Friends, an online network of parents grieving the deaths of their children. But even though Compassionate Friends is not a religious organization, she says, "I often felt alienated by assurances from other members that my son was in heaven or by offers to pray for me, comforts that were kindly meant but that I do not believe and cannot accept."

Can we therefore conclude that because the vast majority of your posts are copy/paste from other people, you actually don't have any thoughts whatsoever?

Marrying a 6 year old and waiting until she reaches puberty and maturity before having consensual sex is better than walking up to
a stranger in a bar and proceeding to have relations with no valid proof of the intent of the person. Muhammad wins. ~ Fatihah
If they don't want to be killed then they have to subdue to the Islamic laws. - Uncung
There would be peace if you obeyed us.~Uncung
Without God, you are lower than sh!t. ~ SpiritandTruth

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

Is all of our history there in front of our face? Religious ideas with seeming "proof". Many similar "histories" within religion. Neanderthals? Cro Magnons? Niphthilum? Proof of Evolution? Atheism? What's our true history? Is our true history more bizzare than we can understand or know?

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:Why do so many atheists need and want a separate godless subculture... for grief support, or anything else?

Having been to my share of Christian funerals myself, I can attest that most funerary sermons I've seen have been religious advertising presented as comfort. I cannot myself say whether Christians find them comforting, but to me they seem patronising, cynical, manipulative and emotionally immature. Were I grieving I wouldn't find such opportunistic fabrications comforting, and I can completely understand why, in a society more religious than my own, families who are not of faith don't want insensitive evangelicals and other proselytes presuming the right to posture at their event -- and I've heard that pastoral care in the US is prone to doing that.

I hadn't seen the Grief Beyond Belief before, but its mission statement says: The aim of Grief Beyond Belief is to facilitate peer-to-peer grief support for atheists, Humanists, and other Freethinkers by providing spaces free of religion, spiritualism, mysticism, and evangelism in which to share sorrow and offer the comfort of rational compassion. [http://www.griefbeyondbelief.org...]. So it seems consistent with the perspective I offered above. It's not the sort of service I would use myself, but I can understand why it might be especially attractive in a country whose religiosity has been compared to that of a developing nation. [http://www.gallup.com...] And its value offering is clearly not 'godlessness' but rational compassion. I'm trying to think of a circumstance under which that would not be desirable. Perhaps you can suggest one, Bronto?

With that said, I also don't see it as creation of subculture. It's simply rejection of insensitive practices and traditions that dominate a country whose religious zeal is out of step with the developed world. It may lead to the creation of subculture if rejected traditions get replaced with something else, but that hasn't much happened with secular marriage celebrations, so I'm not persuaded it'll happen with secular funerals either.

Yet if it did, so what? Christian celebrations of births, marriages and deaths have taken a wide range of forms -- and modern Christian societies also contain Jews, Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists, Sikhs, Jains, Zoroastrians and native beliefs. All have their own specific ceremonies in life milestones. Is there some special reason people of no religious belief should not, if they wanted, establish their own traditions?

Finally, the 'so many' seems biased and unsubstantiated, Bronto. A Pew study indicated that two thirds of atheists seldom or never talk about their irreligion to people of faith. [http://www.pewresearch.org...]. So are you really suggesting that largely silent atheists are using a niche service to seed a subculture?

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

Death, also known as the Grim Reaper, The Destroyer, The Hooded One, The Angel of Death, & The "God" of Death, etc. is a common element in human cultures and history. Death is an iconic character throughout the world and is famous for the "Death Touch." As a personified force it has been imagined in many different ways. The popular depiction of Death as a skeletal figure carrying a large scythe and clothed in a black cloak with a hood first arose in 15th century England, while the title "the Grim Reaper" is first attested in 1847.

In some mythologies, the Grim Reaper actually causes the victim's death by coming to collect them. In turn, people in some stories try to hold on to life by avoiding Death's visit, or by fending Death off with bribery or tricks. Other beliefs hold that the Spectre of Death is only a psychopomp, serving to sever the last ties between the soul and the body, and to guide the deceased to the afterlife, without having any control over when or how the victim dies. In many mythologies (including Anglo-American), Death is personified in male form, while in others, Death is perceived as female (for instance, Marzanna in Slavic mythology).

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:Memo to Religious People: Many Atheists Don't Want to Hear That Their Loved Ones "Are in Heaven" -- New

You're retarded. There is nothing I want more than to be wrong and hear that my relatives are doing fine in the afterlife.

Group for Non-Believers Helps Atheists Grieve

In a society that reflexively copes with death by using religion, grieving atheists are turning to each other.

How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

A new online faith-free grief support group, Grief Beyond Belief, is grappling with that very question. And the launch of the group, along with its rapid growth, presents another compelling question: Why do so many atheists need and want a separate godless subculture... for grief support, or anything else?

Grief Beyond Belief was launched by Rebecca Hensler after the death of her 3-month-old son. Shortly after Jude's death, she discovered Compassionate Friends, an online network of parents grieving the deaths of their children. But even though Compassionate Friends is not a religious organization, she says, "I often felt alienated by assurances from other members that my son was in heaven or by offers to pray for me, comforts that were kindly meant but that I do not believe and cannot accept."

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

I find it absurd that you're asking for proof of a plain truth while believing in absurdities.

Many people believe in religious things to fulfill Maslow's hiearachy of needs, but it mostly exists to calm people's feelings of death. That is why the church uses the promise of everlasting life to draw people in. You can see why people believe by looking at the recruiting techniques, the makn one being promise of eternal life

I find it absurd that you're asking for proof of a plain truth while believing in absurdities.

Many people believe in religious things to fulfill Maslow's hiearachy of needs, but it mostly exists to calm people's feelings of death. That is why the church uses the promise of everlasting life to draw people in. You can see why people believe by looking at the recruiting techniques, the makn one being promise of eternal life

This assumes we only believe because of reward and not that we believe because it seems to some of us as the most likely conclusion.

At 2/2/2016 3:52:29 PM, brontoraptor wrote:How do you deal with death -- your own, or that of people you love -- when you don't believe in God or an afterlife; especially when our culture so commonly handles grief with religion in ways that are so deeply ingrained, people often aren't aware of it?

I find reality to be very comforting. Fairytales are what we tell kiddies but you can have them too and the good thing is that you will never know that they were fairytales 'cause you'll be dead.

I find it absurd that you're asking for proof of a plain truth while believing in absurdities.

Many people believe in religious things to fulfill Maslow's hiearachy of needs, but it mostly exists to calm people's feelings of death. That is why the church uses the promise of everlasting life to draw people in. You can see why people believe by looking at the recruiting techniques, the makn one being promise of eternal life

This assumes we only believe because of reward and not that we believe because it seems to some of us as the most likely conclusion.

I assume you believe it is more logical, but that is nust the rationalizing that is needsd to maintain the illusion. Born of God though t it was more logical to believe he was a saint than not. However when you look at the leaps of logic needed and the pure faith of some absurd positions, it's clear their is a rationalization process going on to maintain the delusion.

I find it absurd that you're asking for proof of a plain truth while believing in absurdities.

Many people believe in religious things to fulfill Maslow's hiearachy of needs, but it mostly exists to calm people's feelings of death. That is why the church uses the promise of everlasting life to draw people in. You can see why people believe by looking at the recruiting techniques, the makn one being promise of eternal life

This assumes we only believe because of reward and not that we believe because it seems to some of us as the most likely conclusion.

I assume you believe it is more logical, but that is nust the rationalizing that is needsd to maintain the illusion.

Absurd accusation, What is the illusion? The fact that we have our existence on a planet that every where you turn knowledge and information is woven into it's very fabric or the fact that the world is a marvel full of wonder that can only be understood by being in awe at it's majesty? Or the fact the if God did exist, such a universe displaying an immense power and an ability to manifest itself into innumerable potential?

No, we just want to believe because we are delusional,

Give me a break, I could not disbelieve even if I wanted,

Born of God though t it was more logical to believe he was a saint than not. However when you look at the leaps of logic needed and the pure faith of some absurd positions, it's clear their is a rationalization process going on to maintain the delusion.